Lost in Time
by Xandre
Summary: Following a misjump through time, the soldiers of the Star League Defence Force, Four Hundred and Forty-Second Royal Division, known also as the Arctic Wolves, find themselves in an Inner Sphere they hardly recognise (AU)
1. One: The Orders

**Lost in Time**

Following a misjump through time, the soldiers of the Star League Defence Force, Four Hundred and Forty-Second Royal Division, known also as the Arctic Wolves, find themselves in an Inner Sphere they hardly recognise (AU)

**Chapter One: The Orders**

**[A/N: Don't own battletech. Ballistics would be better if I did...]**

_...She'd won it, at least in her mind, a mere three hours into the assignment. He'd left his 'Mech, and she could have ended him then. Hell, she could have ended him in fifteen minutes. So far, it had extended to fifteen hours, all because her commander had told her to scare the fear of god into her target. But she wasn't scaring him. Granted, he wasn't moving nearly as brashly as he had been, and each time she'd seen his face through her scope, she never saw fear in his eyes. This time, she saw him in profile, and she lined up her scope, sighting a deliberate miss._

_A gentle squeeze of the trigger, and the last two panes of glass on the cockpit shattered._

_The next time she went for the cockpit, it would be for the kill..._

_**October 5**__**th**__**, 2782  
SLDF Royal Division War Ship Wolves' Den  
Hangar Bay Two**_

General Aleksandr Kerensky didn't generally have the opportunity to communicate with the commander of his best men, General Nikolai Kerensky Jr. of the Four Hundred and Forty-second Royal Division. They were the only unit whom the aging General could place his absolute trust, which said a lot because his best men got that way by being the sneakiest bastards he'd ever heard of. In truth, the Jr. moniker wasn't needed, but given that there was a Nikolai Kerensky that came before himself, the man in question began signing with the Jr. moniker to help avoid confusion.

Most of the time, anyway.

Right now, Aleksandr Kerensky was standing in just one of the hangar bays of the 442nd's War Ship, the experimental _Wolves' Den_. It was a veritable behemoth designed for the Royal Divisions, and this particular ship was still considered a Military Secret – it wasn't known to anyone outside the military, and penalties for revealing information about it were... _Stiff_ to say the least. The Drop Ship he was in could have theoretically fit inside the hangar – the _Styx_ class Drop Ships they housed were far larger, if not technically less powerful than the Overlord he'd arrived in, but they put the unarmed and under-armoured Drop Ship to good use. He hadn't seen any on his way in, which meant all four attachments were currently out on priority missions. And normally, his most trusted General was out with one of them. It really hammered home how loyal the man was that he turned down fighting alongside his own soldiers for this – the man was on the field of battle more than most of his own soldiers!

One of the advantages of this ship was its artificial gravity generators, something almost everyone had consigned to only ever existing in science fiction novels, and it meant his men could always fight in a familiar environment, though quite why they always had the system set to one-point-two-five gees was beyond him. Oh, he had his guesses, but he ultimately decided he was better off not knowing. It also meant he always had to adjust to the extra gravitational force on his body making him feel heavier. On the other hand, it made him feel somewhat more secure – an attacking force would have to deal with suddenly feeling more perceived weight, while the Wolves were trained to actually thrive in these higher-gravity situations. What that extra quarter of a gee meant for the structural integrity of their 'Mechs, the man honestly didn't want to know.

He mentally chastised himself for his train of thought – he'd come here to discuss something he could only discuss with the man in private; the ramifications of this plan leaking out... No, best not to think of it, lest he goad the universe.

"General Kerensky?" said a well-built man, who looked to be between the normal height of an SLDF Soldier and the towering monstrosity that was General Nikolai Kerensky's right-hand man, "We have orders to escort you to Boss' office"

"Lead on, then" the aged General replied, following behind the armed infantryman and the four men that flanked him, each clad in their distinct muscle suit come power armour, each armed with a standard-issue laser rifle, each bearing the same marking within their unit.

'_A Wolf Pack, all to myself_' he thought, '_It is not often I see these men in action. Then again, that _is_ the idea behind them..._'

Wolf Packs were the Arctic Wolves' infantrymen. They had weaker armour than the SLDF standard, but they had better camouflage systems, were generally more agile than their counterparts and could lift a lot more equipment. They also had very advanced communication equipment, allowing them almost seamless communications on a battlefield, which amplified their performance somewhat and made them far deadlier than the sum of their numbers. It was said that the only thing that outranks their loyalty to each other, is their loyalty to their XO, something General Aleksandr Kerensky was envious of. It was often a chore to get the soldiers under him to the life-or-death situations where they were needed, but these men, these men would take the order _and get the job done_. Now, if the rest of the SLDF was like that, then maybe they wouldn't be in this mess to begin with. Cameron's assassination would have been avoidable situation if the men he'd have gone to first weren't too far away, and the men he'd been forced to deploy instead weren't up to the task. The post mortems... Weren't pretty.

His musings were cut short by the leader of this pack stating, "We're here. Boss is waiting inside. We're your assigned escort for your stay here. You don't leave that room unless it's a critical emergency or Boss buzzes you out. I'm sure you can understand the reasons for this."

In any other unit, Aleksandr Kerensky would worry. But not with these men – they were famous for their paranoia, none more so than the man he was about to visit, _especially_ when he was concerned. Then again, if he'd survived even half as many of the assassination attempts as his right-hand man had, then he would probably be at least as paranoid.

He faced the door and it slid open so quickly and quietly he almost flinched, and stepped inside the simply-decorated office. Aside from the thick mahogany furnishings, there was little in the way of elaborate expenditure many other officers were known for. The mahogany actually disguised bulletproof frames and plates. Oh, the table wouldn't be bulletproof for long, but it'd give the man behind the desk a few more seconds to react. And in war, seconds could be the difference between the bullet hitting your position or your _former_ position.

Aleksandr Kerensky did not find it unusual that the general he was looking for was not at his desk. Rather, he walked towards the chair in front of him and heard the distinct _click_ of a handgun being taken off safety. General Aleksandr Kerensky may have been old, but he was still a ranking officer of the Star League Defence Force. He was still as fit as any soldier should be and was still just as, if not trickier than he had been in his youth. And true to these facts, he wheeled round and disarmed his assailant, peeling the gun from his hand through a smooth, practiced motion that left him with a gun and his assailant on knee and staring down its barrel.

"Guess you still got it, then." Said the assailant with a grin.

"Kerensky, if you were _any other man_ I would have you court-martialled for this." Aleksandr sternly replied, taking stock of the man in question. A little short by SLDF standards, but he had to have been toned under that outfit, because the Wolves placed physical fitness as a priority across all areas, while he had mid-length blue hair and bright blue eyes, his outfit was clean, but bereft of the medals and campaign ribbons he had won over his years of active service.

"And if I were any other man, you'd have just shot me and been done with it," was Nikolai Kerensky's casual reply, spoken as he got up off the floor, "So what's the situation, and what's the suicide mission?"

Aleksandr Kerensky pulled out a sealed envelope and handed both it and the gun he'd taken from his subordinate to his subordinate, who then motioned the aged general towards the chair opposite his own, covering his commander's rear as he walked behind him, both men taking a seat – Nikolai laid back, relaxed and seemingly carefree, Aleksandr in a rigid position brought about from more than half a century of active duty. Aleksandr Kerensky opened the same sealed envelope he had not long before given to his subordinate, which had been slid across the table to him.

In truth, such actions were commonplace – the number of tricks spies, traitors or folks who were just that fed up with a particular person would attempt were frankly ludicrous. Which meant it was something of an unofficial policy within the SLDF, that anyone handing over any kind of package, had to open the package him and/or herself to catch out the few trapped packages that slipped through even the best filtering systems. However, General Aleksandr Kerensky had no qualms about what he was doing – everything within the document was material he had inspected and worked with exclusively from beginning to end, and it hadn't left his person since he left his office two months ago for this private meeting.

Nikolai Kerensky, satisfied nothing was wrong with the documents, took the thick envelope from his commanding officer and looked them over. Most of it was summarisations of reports both Generals had come to similar conclusions over, while some outlined a most unusual plan. One that had General Nikolai Kerensky looking over them in shock.

"General Kerensky." Aleksandr stated, staring the man down, "What is the current situation within the Inner Sphere?"

Nikolai didn't even flinch when he replied, "Bad. A lot of fronts are starting to crumble, and we can't be spread out amongst all of them. We can't cut down on our training, or things will just get constantly worse." The man's features turned serious, and he pinched the bridge of his nose, "As much as it pains me to say it, the days of the Star League are definitely limited. Cameron's assassination wouldn't have helped matters in the slightest."

"And as much as it pains me to say this, I would not be here if the situation were anything but irrecoverable. General, I estimate the League has six to eight months left before the fronts become too strained and the lines break – this time for good. We cannot stop the onslaught of the entire Inner Sphere, and if this plan leaked, it would be mayhem." Aleksandr replied, leaning into the backrest of his chair.

Nikolai let out an exasperated sigh and ran one hand over his blue hair before saying, "What would you have us do, commander? My men are generally no more than a few day's travel away. We can gather them within two weeks if need be."

"You have seen the plan, Nikolai." Aleksandr calmly replied, "We both know what I need you to do. I need you to recon new, habitable systems for us. The Star League Defence Force is leaving the Inner Sphere."

Nikolai Kerensky, as a rule, didn't believe things unless he had a second witness to the fact. And General Aleksandr Kerensky was one of the few men whose word he trusted absolutely. He wasn't the kind to lie to the few people he could intimately trust and Nikolai had never been given reason to doubt him. So while he didn't believe the slip of paper, he believed it when his commanding officer told him to do it.

"But sir!" he snapped back, eyes going slightly wide as his slack posture straightened a little, "The Great Houses will tear themselves apart! Without the armada holding things in place, the fighting will come to a head! It'll be a Battle Royale more than a Civil War!"

"General, I like this plan less than you do. But I see no other choice – our armed forces are weakening and if we don't leave now, all we shall accomplish is making the death toll that little bit higher. With this plan, we can return – not us, perhaps not our children, or even our children's children, but someday, we will return. And we will bring about an end to whatever squabbles they may still have."

Nikolai eyed the man for a moment before saying, "And if they have no need for us? Do we simply leave them be, continue as a separate colony? Or what if they completely destroy themselves? What then, General?"

Aleksandr sighed for a moment before replying, "If they become peaceful, we will ask to return. If they do not want us, we will leave them be, return to whatever home we may have and build our own society from there." He pursed his lips in distaste, "And if all that is left is far more primitive, then we return to them as saviours, and mould them into a people reluctant to enter a state of war. The Star League will survive somehow. But not like this, not with all that has happened. There is too much hate, too much bad blood between us. This League has died, and it was terminal far before you were born. All we have been doing these past years was simply staving off the lighting of the Pyre."

Nikolai's eyes closed and he nodded grimly at this before replying, "Which direction would you have us take, General?"

Aleksandr thought for a moment before replying, "Whichever direction you so choose. Once you leave the Periphery, leave behind reconnaissance beacons. I already have a chit for enough for tens of thousands of your jumps, and these models can maintain contact with one another. The data we receive should be no more than two months old at any time."

"And when will you depart with your armada?" he asked, opening his eyes again

"When we have gathered all who will follow me, General. Though that will take far more than two months. I assure you, we will not be far behind you."

"And if you perform another miracle? If you save this Star League?"

Aleksandr scowled slightly at the other man."We will contact you through the probes. Any distance up to two thousand light years should be coverable in about a day if a simple, "Incoming Message" alert is sent. I would have thought you would know that I do not make half-baked plans, General."

"Can you blame a man for being too cautious in this day and age, General? It's the job of a subordinate to question the plan – we are, after all, the ones who could be killed by it." Nikolai cracked his knuckles and sighed. "Though I'm convinced. We'll do this task for you – I just wanted to make sure we wouldn't be lost if you no longer had to leave."

"I thank you for this, Kerensky. I doubt I would get many to follow me if I did not have someone blazing a trail for me first."

Aleksandr Kerensky got up and began to walk to the door, stopping and turning around mid-way, "General Nikolai Kerensky, I assure you, the Star League will live again. We will return one day, this I promise you."

Nikolai grinned and replied, "If more than ten years pass with no response from you after we find a suitable system, we shall rebuild under the assumption your task suffered critical failure. Through your descendants or mine, General, the League _will_ rise again. This _I_ promise _you_."

With that, Nikolai buzzed out his commander and set about working out the best way to relay the worst orders his men would probably ever receive. After all, the Arctic Wolves did _not_ like to run away. But there was one thing Boss did know. And that was that if they stayed, they'd die alongside the rest of the Inner Sphere.

_It takes some serious firepower to one-shot a cockpit. Unfortunately for the pilot, that means they're often left hearing the bells of Notre-Dame for some time afterwards, and many have a slight ringing afterwards that never quite goes away. Sniping a cockpit is generally a kill shot because even if the cockpit area isn't destroyed, the pilot is disorientated for several seconds, during which subsequent salvos can be used to further damage the 'Mech._

**[A/N: So here it is. The re-write. Much of it will stay the same, and I'll keep using my... I dunno, I'll call them chapter ends, throughout the story. The first one will be relating to the history of some Arctic Wolf or another, past or present. At least, that's the idea, while the bottom will be personal quips and quotes or sayings from other stories or famous people and the likes or the occasional gag piece. Before any of you say, I'll be taking my own spin on the warfare here, so if it looks a bit non-canon to you, keep note of this fact. I have a plan. ]**


	2. Two: The Incident

**Chapter Two: The Incident**

_...She caught him again two hours later, but she didn't have a good angle on the cockpit, and by that logic, her target. While she had rounds that could punch through the armour, they would generally pierce one layer before rebounding off the next, and her commander wanted the 'Mech intact as well. As a high-calibre round pinging around inside the delicate innards of a 'Mech did not go down well with the salvage crews, using an AP round would mean she'd be punished when she got back, which was why she was going for a cockpit kill; she was still sore in places from her last punishment, and didn't want to go through it again..._

_**Two months later,  
Wolves' Den main bridge,  
Terra orbit,  
Nikolai "Boss" Kerensky's POV**_

To say the plan hadn't gone down well with my troops would perhaps be a little too harsh on them – one of the drawbacks of being a unit with sharper than average minds, is that you appreciate the bigger picture. And the bigger picture is that this Star League was failing. So while we didn't like it, we'd still do it – the General ordered, and we would do it. Of course, this withdrawal of ours would lead to the sudden absence of one of the most successful units of the Star League Defence Force, which would mean things would also start to deteriorate much sooner. But the old man was good, and we wouldn't be agreeing to this if we didn't have complete faith in his abilities.

While there were dedicated explorer corps within the League who found new worlds in their travels, they couldn't match the Den and our shiny new prototype engine – once we'd hammered the kinks out, that is. See, the standard K-F drive has been in use for over three hundred years. In technological terms, it meant a replacement is long overdue, and the K-F MkII was meant to be that replacement – while the jumps are shorter, at twenty light years a hop, the battery can recharge in about a day when hooked to its own dedicated reactor, or jump immediately with one of the massive battery arrays that enable the older model the same trick. Though while the MkI is capable of one extra jump, the MkII was capable of two sequential jumps per battery, and the drive could do four jumps, one after the other, before needing some major repair work. There's a betting pool going around over how long it'll take our techies to have that up to six jumps.

The original design of the MkII drive did match the original's sixty light year range, but the SLDF stepped in and placed reliability above all else. Therefore, more reliable and energy-efficient components were chosen, cutting the maximum per-jump range to twenty light years, but this allowed the Den to charge our drive with one of the several onboard reactors, theoretically giving us nigh-unlimited range, while we can recharge the several batteries we have on-board with those same reactors. The getup is as ideal for warfare as it is for exploration, I'm told, but beyond making the flight option more viable in war, I don't see how else it'll help.

Still, there were more important matters at hand. Firstly, getting the betting pool going over how long it would take for things to go wrong. It said a lot about our faith in this new toy, that none of the guesses were in the single-digits. It's a start, I suppose. Then there was securing everything, getting the artificial gravity (a feature unique to our ship) disabled and making sure nothing was out of place – we didn't want to leave anything behind, or screw ourselves right off the bat.

Now, the Den isn't small. It's a three-kilometre long, one kilometre wide and seven hundred and fifty metre tall _juggernaut_ designed for the Royal divisions of the Star League Defence Force, and if the League would have lasted another fifteen years, then this would've been the new standard in Royal technology. It could carry the entire division, while on-board fabricators allowed us to make anything from pretty much anything, so long as we had the raw materials. Of course, the sheer size and complexity of the ship meant a jump procedure took a while, but if everything was properly tethered, then we only needed to do quick checks before the next jump.

"All stations report jump status is green." stated one communications officer, "Permission, to disengage gravity drives and initiate Jump, General?"

I grinned as I said, "Make it so". Then I groaned slightly as I realised the guy didn't get it, and I mourned the death of another classic. On the other hand, we _did_ set off cleanly, which is always good. This procedure went on until the Sixty-fifth jump, when a spatial anomaly hit and we wound up at a dead stop, engines dead and two reactors down. Which wouldn't have been so bad if we weren't _in the god-damned orbital path of an ice planet_!

"Sixty-five!" I yelled, taking a slip of paper from my pocket, "Who had sixty on Sixty-five?"

"I did!" said a helmsman, "But it was under 'Meteor impact'"

"Lyla had sixty on sixty-four and re-entry." said the communications officer, "I think that's more unlikely. Does this mean she wins?"

"Again." I said

"Again." was the strained reply.

And they wonder why I don't bet much anymore. Oh, I'd wagered on this one, but I always took the long-odds option anyways. I never actually won these things.

"Ensign, get me engineering. And maybe see about getting the personnel onto those bloody drop ships. I think we'll have enough space for everyone."

"Aye, aye cap'n!" was the snarky reply as I got the frantic "Yes, sir?" from the head engineering officer.

"You may or may not be aware of the fact we've had a misjump and we are now dead in the water." I deadpanned, speaking into the omni-directional microphone in the middle of the bridge

"Yes..." came the tentative reply over a loudspeaker

"You also may or may not be aware that we had a betting pool on this." I continued in the deadpan manner, looking out to the window and the planet that was slowly increasing in size. All I could think was, _ohcrapohcrapohcrap_.

"I'd be genuinely disappointed if we didn't." came the equally-deadpan reply.

"You may not want to know that Lyla has _won_ that bet." I stated, grinning morbidly and still in a deadpan manner as I gripped the captain's chair.

"It is a Thursday. So we have long enough to get the engines running, but not before guaranteed re-entry. Forty-five minutes?"

"Why, yes. I'll be watching from a drop ship. Bye."

God, I'm glad Lyla installed that "Click" sound effect a few months ago. It neatly censored the oncoming hailstorm of swearing.

"So!" I chirped, in a manner not unlike Lyla, "Five bucks says Lyla's already aboard one of the dropships. Anyone want to give odds on which one?"

"Ten to one on engineering in three!" said one,

"Fifty to one on bridge in two!" said another.

"Twenty says she pounces you!" said a third

"No bet." came my automatic reply, "My back's fucked enough without you getting involved, Corporal Murphy."

I looked towards the planet, "I honestly think we don't have time to finish this pool." I said as I reached the button to open the ship-wide comms, "Fuck it, everyone but engineering out!" I stated as I got off the seat, "They should be well enough aware of procedure that we shouldn't be needed..."

And like that, we made for the safety of the drop ships. God, engineering was going to _hate_ me after this.

_**Forty Minutes Later  
Bridge of Styx-1  
Nikolai Kerensky's POV**_

As it turned out, the engines had suffered some damage. While we had hoped to simply skip across the atmosphere, that was no longer a viable option. Now, we'd get to see the monstrosity that was the Wolves' Den dig a nice, long trench in some god-forsaken ice ball of a planet before we could do anything to fix up the ship. Thankfully, I'm paranoid so we took terraforming and mining equipment with us before we left, so digging up the resources needed shouldn't take more than a year or so, and we had enough of a head-start that my commanding officer shouldn't run out of checkpoints before we got off the ground.

It's a strange thing, watching a war-ship hit re-entry. See, the heat sinks are actually capable of taking the strain and keeping it cool. It's just that getting the damn thing up again tends to take an excessively long time and it's risky as hell, which was why before we tried that, we'd set up a semi-permanent settlement that would act as either an outpost or a home system for the forces that left with my commanding officer. One good thing about ice balls is that they offer everything a fusion engine needs to run for centuries, and the mining operation should ensure we had enough materials to, if not get the ship off the ground, then at least get this place terraformed to a habitable level.

The trench the Den dug was fifteen kilometres long, and the angle was shallow enough that there should have been no damage beyond the superficial, even if she did come down in a screaming descent. Then came the fact the hangar bay doors were still above ground, meaning we could a) return to the ship and b) deploy our forces if need be.

Now it was time to put our contingency plans to the test.

"Okay people!" I stated over a channel that connected all of our current assets – namely the Den, and the four _Styx_ class drop ships, dubbed _Styx I-IV,_ that were our standard drop ships.

Now, let's get it out, here and now: The _Styx_ class is old. It lacks any form of defensive armaments and is under-armoured for its weight. On the flip side, this thing can carry as much as a drop ship of the next class up, and has safely landed while being fifty percent over its stated carrying capacity, which means we can carry a _lot_ more disposable munitions on-board, while a Catapult Take-Off and Landing deck means we have a runway wherever we are, something many commanders overlooked, and which gave us almost unparalleled aerial superiority – destroy all the runways in an area, and all the enemy can deploy are VTOLS, which are slower and easier pickings for our own aerial assets.

Of course, other commanders saw the lack of arms and armour above all else, which put a huge dent in its popularity, which meant the ship quickly fell out of service. It also means we have the last four in existence, saved from the wrecking yard by one of the earliest commanders of the Arctic Wolves, and we were formed well before Aleksandr Kerensky was even born. And the _Styx_ class was old back then. These things are as much a part of the Wolves as our now-signature Marauders, and we're willing to unleash hell, complete with fire and brimstone, to get them back regardless of how reckless we were.

Anyways...

"We need to get a semi-permanent settlement going within two weeks if we're going to survive here. We have the mining equipment and terraforming equipment to either dig right through to the other side, or make another Earth-like planet. You all know the drill, and for fuck's sake be nice to engineering. They'll already be on my back for this stunt, and it'll be patrol duty for three months for the idiot that riles them up. We're running contingency plan triple-theta. That is all."

Triple-Theta meant we were entering a hostile planet with unknown population distribution and little to no guarantee of backup. It meant we'd be approaching the situation with twice the paranoia and three times the firepower we normally would.

Still, it could be worse. Our infantry should be able to operate on a short-range basis while 'Mech assets at the minimum would be operational by the end of the week.

_The dirtiest fight I've ever seen? Two Arctic Wolves arm-wrestling. I had no idea it was possible to fit that much crap into a pair of shirt sleeves..._


	3. Three: The Meet

**Chapter Three: The Meet**

_...She sighted him a half an hour later, moving somewhat erratically as he twisted his head and his 'Mech's torso from side to side, sweeping for her._

_She noticed how he was making far more control adjustments than almost every other pilot she had killed. It was unlikely the VI system was damaged, which meant he had reduced the input it had. She knew about this kind of pilot; the "fly by feel" kind of pilot. And when she thought about it, they had always been the hardest to kill. Regardless, she lined up a shot and gently squeezed a trigger, the urban environment removing most of the wind effect as the round pierced the sky, streaking towards its target..._

_**Two Months Later  
Some god-forsaken Ice Planet in the middle of bloody nowhere  
Nikolai Kerensky's POV**_

I hate Ice Planets. They're cold, but I don't mind that. The Aerospace assets, however, very much _do_ bloody mind that, so we get this stupid situation where the 'Mechs are perfectly all-bloody-right while the aerospace assets freeze up and crash. Repeatedly. Without fail. See, a 'Mech has a reactor that dissipates heat all over the damn thing and keeps it warm, which is why they don't freeze up easily, with the cooler temperature aiding the heat sinks that make sure the lasers don't melt the arm off when fired too much.

Aerospace, however, utilises far more precise engineering, so we get this funny situation where the engines and all that work, but the ailerons freeze up like your computer when you have smut on and the wife's just pulled up into the driveway. The only way to counter that is to fit in a bulky and weighty coolant system to prevent the wings from freezing up, and if that coolant leaks, or the pipes burst, then the ailerons freeze up and your plane goes down and you either bail and die anything up to several hundred degrees to cold, or don't bail out and die several hundred degrees to warm. The Peeping Toms were all operational, which was a good thing, because we knew exactly where everything was, so we could at least set up the _Marauders_ we had with us in ambush formation – Arctic white works so well in these conditions, sometimes the enemy even doubt their own RADAR!

Now, I'm saying all this, because ten minutes ago, we saw a large-ass Drop Ship land in a ravine. As there was no SLDF presence here, then it was either explorer corps – in which case they would have hailed the planet from orbit a few times first and we would know they were there, and they would be able to get someone to help us out of this mess. If it was the SLDF looking for us, then there'd be two Drop Ships – scouting was done with Peeping Toms, and _all_ SLDF Drop Ships within a certain vicinity of a Peeping Tom Spy Satellite would receive the signal transmissions, so we'd know who was there and they'd know we were here. Look, long story short, if it wasn't an enemy, we'd know about them by now. So these guys were either a third party not affiliated with the SLDF or the SLEC (Star League Explorer Corps) who didn't know we were here, which wasn't likely given this was _a god-damned Ice Planet and there is no god-damned reason to land here_, or enemy forces.

One or the other, we were still going to make first contact with a collective four hundred tons plus of the finest military equipment the SLDF could provide, which was why I was with four of my best – Lucas "Fury" Lister, a close-in brawler who stood at six foot nine, had an extensive workout routine and could leave a noticeable dent in whatever he punched. His piercing green eyes and military buzz-cut, combined with the mint condition of his uniform meant he looked a whole lot more intimidating that he actually was, especially when one considers the two-shot, rifle-calibre hand cannon he calls a side-arm. He was in his mid-twenties and he'd spent his entire military career in his custom _Atlas_, which was a powerhouse of experimental technology –three lightened LBX AC/10s and two lightened SRM-6s were all the firepower this behemoth had, and although I didn't know it yet, a lot of what we ran was actually identical to Clan spec, minus the armour, which was standard due to it being easier for us to build. The net result was that each of the LBXs had two tons of ammo; the two SRMs had four tons of ammo to share while a pair of Anti-Missile systems helped keep him in the field for longer.

Up next came Jonathan "Borg" Jones. He was the oldest man in the unit, well into his sixties, but there's few I'd ever trust to watch my back as much as I trust him. He was tall, thin and scarred heavily, kept his dark hair cut military-short and had steely silver eyes that almost looked through you. He stripped out everything but the armour on his 'Mech, and replaced it with four medium and two large pulse lasers and the long-range Hellfires replaced by an SRM 6, while our triple-strength heat sinks kept the machine in check, and then removed a few tonnes of armour were removed in favour of a larger engine for top speed. The net result is that thing can put most medium 'Mechs to shame. It was the ultimate example of the heavy scout – fast enough to spot the kink in the enemy's armour, and able to exploit it right away. The man himself was grouchy, made a mule look compliant and wasn't afraid to voice his honest opinion.

Third was Thomas "Blitz" Jones. He was close enough to myself in appearance that we sometimes pulled a brothers act, with long silver hair and silver eyes, neither of which I was sure were natural and piloted a machine identical to Borg, preferring the higher speed of that Marauder variant over the standard Unit one, which was quick in its own right and not something to be trifled with, but to each his own and all...

Then there was Samantha Smith. At fourteen, she was theoretically too young to be in the unit, but she was a war brat, and knew how to fight and how to kill at least as good as anyone else in the unit and her loyalties lay exclusively with me – where I went, she invariably followed unless I specifically ordered her not to, and even then she tended to cover me with her favourite anti-anything bolt action rifle. She could reach out and touch you from over two miles out if she needed to, both in and out of a 'Mech. Normally, she piloted a _Commando_ with a jury-rigged main gun from one of our tanks, which was modified with an auto-loader, but that specific 'Mech was slag. So we took the base design of Blitz's 'mech, stripped out the guns and had Lyla put in a few of her auto-loading main guns due to be mounted on our tanks. Each only fired about every four seconds, but the auto-loader is reliable and the ammo's light enough that the two ton guns can fire their shared ten tons of reloads until the god-damned cows come home – she doesn't have the Hellfires, but she does have the torso-mounted lasers.

The five man assembly we ran was unique to us, and it was something my commanding officer was thinking of putting into common tactics at some point in the future. It also meant we had a unique layout during patrols, with the five pilots forming a rough, five-pointed star formation. The Lance Leader is rarely directly out in front though – too many commanders have died because of that common mistake of taking the lead when they should have been hanging back.

Right now I was in the cockpit of my unit-standard Marauder, the chilling sensation of my cooling suit perking me up as I went through the final checkouts on the multi-function displays – unlike most 'Mech cockpits, we utilise a more expensive upgraded system that gives each 'Mech advanced communications system equivalent to a standard command cockpit with two tons of communications equipment. The net result is we're always better co-ordinated, with each pilot capable of sharing their targeting data almost immediately and often to devastating effect. These MFDs are also the reason we can fit non-standard equipment so easily – our cockpits have a sort of plug and play capability that means we don't have to worry about the complex re-wiring involved in attaching a different weapon system, allowing us far greater technical flexibility – we can strip out everything from our Marauders and turn them into pure missile boats. All we have to do is replace the weapons and squeeze in the reloads.

But that's beside the point – right now we have an unknown quantity to deal with.

I got the all clear and put on my neurohelmet, the familiar HUD coming up – our multi-function targeting computer, which could calculate with near-pinpoint accuracy the location each individual weapon would hit up to five hundred metres, at which point it went a bit crazy and the familiar Head Arms Torso Legs armour bars – mine on the right, Sam's on the left to make sure the screens were working properly.

"Okay people." I stated, catching their attention, "We have an unknown quantity due six miles north from here. I shouldn't have to emphasize the need for caution – we don't know where we are and unless we've hopped through time, there is no way the SLDF could have tracked us here so fast."

I worked my 'Mech up to the hangar doors as my men followed suite, the hangar bay lights casting long shadows on the virgin snow as we prepared for our heavy scouting run in a blizzard. Heavy scouting meant we would be running the recon of an area with no knowledge of what to expect – which meant the units doing the recon work had to be able to shoot back, and while a light-weight glass cannon might work better, we simply have no idea what they can sling our way and we should have firepower impunity here – the cold, combined with triple-strength heat sinks allowed us to fire our lasers until something breaks, though the max-level concussion rifles would still put a bit of a heat strain on the 'Mech – the over clocked weapon didn't dissipate the heat as quickly as it should, and speeding up the cooling process too much _always_ broke something. Still, it was a good edge to have – it took some specific manual tweaking to get our feared fifth level and it could only be activated on a 'Mech with five or more triple-strength heat sinks, it put out that much heat.

But all that's also beside the point. What we have now is a situation wherein we may have to engage in a turf war against god-knows-what, and all we knew about our enemy was they used a standard issue re-entry – no hot drops, no advanced recon work, nothing, which meant they were either overconfident or underprepared. Either one helped us out for different reasons.

So we got into a rhombus-based patrol formation – Sam at the front, whilst diagonally back, either side from her lay Blitz and Borg, ready to pot-shot any flankers while I took up the rear, ready to cover one or the other if need be while Fury lay in the middle, his close-in brawler restricted by the range. It was his job to blast anything that got too close with those LBX-10s of his.

"Okay troops, the objective's the ravine two clicks north. We don't have any idea of what enemy force concentration is, so we have to assume it's a rogue Royal. Keep your weapons hot and tempers cool – I don't want any more heroics than necessary and try to minimise damage – we can't afford a bust 'Mech right now. I want all of us on passive radar for now."

"Roger that, Lead" replied Fury's voice over the comm, "Star formation on entry?"

"Nah – we'll napalm that bridge when we get to it. For now, focus on maintaining visual contact. We need to get to that ravine before this blizzard fades; we want to maintain the element of surprise as long as possible. Remember folks, the blizzard's made the Peeping Toms effectively useless. Call 'em as you see 'em"

The romp to the ravine was interrupted primarily by the blizzard not fading, meaning we were still blind, though within the ravine we had more or less standard vision, given it was actually night right now, but we weren't going to use flashlights or active radar – we needed every edge we could get.

The ravine itself wasn't anything special, though it was somewhat wider than we thought – the ice had formed something of an overhang, making it look a lot narrower than it actually was, so we could go two abreast. That meant Sam would take point beside me, while the Jones brothers would cover our flanks as Fury got the rear – there were some turns here, and everything was within range of his short-range brawler. Net result, we had the advantage.

Then, of course, we found the enemy dropship as we hit something of a plateau within the ravine, and we could see where the dropship had crashed through the ice and landed clean by way of a miracle, a skilled pilot or both. There was also a group of five 'Mechs out there, three that looked like a cross between a standard-spec _Marauder_ and a _Catapult_ (which was making my targeting computer go erratic), and two monstrosities that looked like nothing I'd ever seen before, with arms carrying what looked like some variant of an AC/5, I could see a few laser barrels and most importantly I could see each of them had an LRM-10 rack on them.

And looking at the other enemy 'Mechs, how many damn LRMs does one machine need? Let's see... Two apparent LRM-20 racks on what the computer decided to call _Mad Cats_. And the twenty LRMs carried by those two unknowns made for, drum roll please, one hundred-forty LRMs per group salvo. Yeah, one of us ain't coming back from this.

Then I saw a communications alert from an unknown source. Two guesses who it was. I responded anyways – any time spent chatting would allow us time to aim at them, and they couldn't lock on with the LRMs – we'd get the lock warning and we'd open fire. Here's to not being slag by the end of the day...

"So the _Surats_ respond!" said a somewhat agitated and pompous voice, "I am Jacob Ward of Clan Wolf. I ask that you identify yourselves."

_Proud warrior race much?_ I thought as I replied, "I'm General Nikolai Kerensky, commander of the SLDF four-hundred-and-forty-second Royal division. Now, who is Clan Wolf? There was no such unit within the SLDF records when we left."

I reset the concussion rifle on the right hand to level five and left hand to level four – I wanted an opening salvo that could potentially cripple them. Then I realised, I was just at the outer edge of our weapon's effective range – only Sam really had a clear shot, and our Hellfires were meant more for an anti-air role. This was going to be _fun_.

"You jest, quiaff?" 'Jacob' replied, "There is no valid reason for anything not of the Clans to be out here, now _identify yourselves_."

Well that was great. This one wasn't paranoid – he'd have blasted our 'Mechs out first, so he was resolutely against hearing anything that wasn't what he expected, so I gave a subtle gesture with my Marauder's right arm, indicating to my men that now was the time to aim.

"I have no idea what you're on about!" I stated, easing my own fingers on the trigger and getting ready to charge forward and into concussion rifle range, "We had a mis-jump and here the fuck we are!"

"End this tasteless joke!" 'Jacob' barked, one of the 'Mechs swaying its arm, "Identify your Clan now, _Surats_, or face the true might of Clan Wolf!"

"And I've already told you." I replied as calmly as I could, "I don't know who you're talking about. We were undergoing a planetary reconnaissance mission for General Aleksandr Kerensky when we had a mis-jump and ended up here. You're the first non-442nd contact we've had in a while."

Apparently, this wasn't enough, and it'd _somehow_ pissed him off, going by his response.

"You dare mock the name of our Great Father?!" he roared over the radio, "Wolves! Let us defeat these _Surats_ and show them the strength of a true-born mechwarrior!"

Now, theoretically, only the LRMS should have had the range to hit us at around this range – seven hundred metres, but the enemy 'Mechs seemed to have extended range weapons, something that even the skunk works of the SLDF was having trouble with, so they got us with a complete opening salvo of lasers and LRMs that blasted Fury's _Atlas_ almost to ruin as armour was laid to waste across the board and weapons either jammed or exploded.

"Fury, get the hell out of here! We won't be able to mount an effective rescue operation if you have to bail!" I barked into the headpiece as three of us began closing the distance.

I got a disgruntled grunt of acknowledgement as his shattered _Atlas_ turned its back to the field of battle and began limping home.

At this point, I suppose it would be wise to mention the reason Sam has a tank gun and not a Gauss rifle mounted. The reason is simple – Gauss slugs are rather fragile compared to the armour they hit, which means the slugs often fragment when they impact, meaning although the slugs do impressive damage to armour, they have surprisingly little chance of piercing the armour, which is why 'Mech snipers choose between Gauss Rifles and PPCs for sniping instead of one being the superior sniping system.

Now, our tanks use a High-Velocity Armour-Piercing round that goes clean through a 'Mech's armour, and even Fury's _Atlas_ offers little resistance to the penetrating power of the round. That's also a downside – it goes clean through, so the chances of actually causing an ammo explosion are rare, as what tends to cause them is heated shell fragments rattling around and striking the gunpowder or warheads of a weapon and causing a chain reaction, or a missile explosion causing the ammo bins to go up as well, or a laser superheating the ammo bin to the point of auto-ignition. You get the point. This means that those rounds are inferior in theory – they do almost nothing to a 'Mech other than hit in the front and exit through the rear and such, leaving an entry hole very similar to the exit hole and doing little to the internals, which have a bit more space in between them than one might thing – oh, there may be miles of cables in an _Atlas_, but paranoiac use of cable tidies and smart packing that would be the envy of even the most seasoned jet-setter means that even the most cramped machine has at least twice as much space and redundancy as you think it has. What this means for us is that, unless we deliberately aim for a critical system, we ain't doing much damage.

I say this because Sam is an expert shot, and the gun has a range of about two and a half miles before ballistics are accounted for, and she has a fun little modification to her targeting computer that tells her where critical components should be in a known machine. It may not be able to overlay the image onto her targets, but countless hundreds of pilots can attest to how little that matters to her, and while we don't really know anything about these 'Mechs, cockpits are obvious and joints are always good targets.

So we got some return fire in – my left concussion rifle caused an ammo explosion when it shredded the missile pod of one of the _Mad Cats_, though it did less damage than I thought it should have, while Sam was able to snipe the cockpit of a second and nail the other rocket pod on the one I crippled, effectively halving the maximum salvo size, the missile-less _Mad Cat_ charging forwards as his compatriot slumped to the floor.

"That was truly a shot worthy of a Nova Cat!" Jacob roared, "Most impressive, but you shall still fall before the might of the true Wolves, _Surats_!"

Unfortunately for me, my level five concussion rifle decided to have a moment, the weapon going from the green "ready" to the red "malfunction" state, used for everything from the weapon having no ammo to a state where it's in sixteen different pieces, two of which are in your 'Mech, and _not_ in a good way. Still, a lot of their long-range punch was gone, so the second salvo was easier to dodge and slammed into the rock wall behind me, thankfully not bringing down the entrance.

Blitz and Borg, however, knew their variant was a right tricky bastard to hit and they'd bolted as soon as the missiles were fired and were weaving towards the enemy, taking rapid-fire pot-shots with no regard for accuracy, more rounds missing than not, stray bolts kicking up clouds of steam as they superheated the snow as they tried to swing round to the rear of our opponents, dealing glancing blows, claiming another LRM-20 rack from the remaining _Mad Cat_.

Then things went downhill – Borg's _Marauder_ took an unlucky hit to his SRM system and the internal explosions forced his retreat. So, he reversed out as he fired erratically to keep potential pursuit off his tail and Blitz followed suite in a machine which was lacking armour everywhere – our objective was intelligence, and now we knew that they were hostile to us and had some idea of what they had, we had to pull back and plan accordingly. We may not have much in the way of active soldiers, but we have more than enough machines. Our priority was now the survival of the men who worked them.

Sam had ducked back to the path we'd come in, ensuring a rearward attack was unlikely as she took pot shots at the enemy cockpits. Although she hit the enemy almost every time, they were too agile to be hit in critical areas consistently so rounds passed through other areas instead, meaning we had the disadvantage in both agility and numbers. That is, until Sam got a shot in on the cockpit of one of the large 'Mechs and killed the pilot, bringing the number down to three on two, though we'd taken a pounding – a combined LRM salvo had destroyed one of Sam's tank guns while I'd lost the systems on my left arm completely, limiting me to my lasers and a hellfire system that wasn't all that good against ground targets.

I took stock of the situation – Sam was in the ravine, ready to retreat at a moment's notice. I was four hundred metres ahead of her while this Jacob fellow was still kicking about praise for Sam's accuracy.

"Sam!" I barked as my remaining Concussion Rifle went green, "Get the hell out of here, I'll cover for you."

Of course, she protested the order but she still obeyed – better one of us went down than two of us. Unfortunately, another LRM salvo followed her as my level five shot went wide; impacting the ground and causing an explosion that earned me an increase in enemy radio chatter, while the missiles missed and crashed into the rock wall, causing a landslide as she cleared away, potentially trapping me in with them. Fun times.

"It is three on one, _Surat_." Jacob growled in anger. We'd somewhat bloodied his men, after all, "Will you accept our offer of honourable surrender?"

Okay, so what are my options here? Headshots with the torso lasers and the remaining arm-mounted laser were possible, but risky while we were far enough apart that my Hellfires would lock and hit.

Probably.

Maybe.

Hopefully.

_Please_?

"You're in the big 'Mech, aren't you?" I asked, locking the Hellfires to his cockpit, lining up the torso for the not so crippled Mad Cat and aiming the final gun at the rather crippled Mad Cat. I had one chance, and the armour state of my 'Mech was nearing the point of critical failure; I couldn't take a three on one salvo – two had to go down here or I'd had it. The remaining Concussion Rifle would need fifteen seconds to recharge and heat sink damage meant it'd take about thirty more after that before I could safely fire it again.

I got the lock tone from the missiles and I fired. "Not just yet!"

Guess what? It didn't work. The two _Mad Cats_ were hit, but I missed the cockpits and only succeeded in melting off a decent amount of armour on the less crippled one and missed the other one completely. The Hellfires hit the cockpit, but didn't kill the pilot. Yeah, it was wounded, but nowhere near enough.

"It will take far more than that to down a _Dire Wolf_, _Surat_" Jacob growled, confirming my suspicions, "You seek a fight to the end? Then have it!"

With that, they locked and fired a volley of missiles at my 'Mech. I dodged most of them but took some bad leg damage, limiting me to a slow limp as I hastily wrestled the controls to keep her upright as I went for the eject function – I had on arctic survival clothing and the mandatory presence of relevant survival gear in our cockpits meant I should be able to get contact with a Peeping Tom for navigation back to the Den. Of course, the eject function didn't and I got that ringing sensation as I slammed my head against the headrest from a salvo of way too god-damn many ballistic weapons hitting my cockpit and blacked out when a stray piece of metal hit my neurohelmet.

_"Never get between an Arctic Wolf and their coffee" – Anonymous SLDF officer, wounded in action_


	4. Four: The First of Many

**Chapter Four: The First of Many**

_... Unfortunately for her, her target moved somewhat erratically, and moved himself out of the way of the shot. Fortunately for her, the round slammed into the supporting structure, exploding shrapnel into the cockpit at random, with one piece blasting through his lung and nearly wrenching his shoulder free, but he still managed to move his 'Mech into the adjacent street, denying her the second round that would have killed him. Cursing her luck, she moved to intercept him once again..._

_**Fuck knows how long later,  
Nikolai Kerensky's POV**_

It was the kind of waking up where the brain starts before the body, so you get to watch your eyelids for a while as the rest of you got the message that it was time to get up.

'_Okay_', I thought as my body finally decided to work, '_Spot check, what hurts_?'

With that I moved a little as I tried to get a bearing on things.

'_Okay_', I thought, '_Spot check, what _doesn't_ hurt_?'

All right, truth be told I felt okay. I just found it funny.

Internal joke aside, I ever so slightly cracked open an eye to see where the hell I was and it took me all of four seconds to think I was in hostile territory; Lyla hadn't jumped me yet and there was no soothing classic rock on the intercom.

The heathens...

Then I eased my head around so I could get some rough bearings. If you were subtle enough, most folk tended to think you were still asleep. And it was at that point I definitely _knew_ I wasn't in friendly territory because one of the walls was curved – which meant I was in the Drop Ship-slash-base of this Jacob lad, while the lack of medical banter told me I was alone in the room.

There wasn't any point in looking for a camera, because the modern ones were small enough that they could be hidden in the light fixtures, so if they had them, there'd be nothing you could do anyways. There was also a lack of the beep-beep-beep that came with a machine that monitored something to make sure you were still alive. Which meant one of two things – One: My injuries didn't span far enough beyond the initial knockout to warrant extensive medical care or Two: I'd smashed another one in my sleep, which meant I would either be so sore I wouldn't be moving at all right now, or I was so hopped up on painkillers, someone could be stabbing me right now and it'd be evens I wasn't feeling it.

So taking all of this into stock, I got up and looked around proper. The walls were bare, the cover was surprisingly warm and the door had a window that gave a poor view of my bed. Either this was a rush job, or they have _some_ consideration for privacy. This meant I could do my favourite old trick of padding out the bed to make it look like I was still in there. Saved my bacon during basic, I spent a lot of the nights partying. It'd be a feat if I could do it well, because I had almost nothing to work with...

'_Oh yeah, dignity levels of medical gown_!' I thought, looking down. Thankfully, they were unisex and covered all the vital areas.

Now, there was bound to be a guard near the door – they couldn't be _that_ stupid, which meant I had to deal with him. The fact that there was no switch on the inside meant this room was most probably for the rowdier patients, or these folk took their medical security very seriously. This called for an old gambit of mine – get by the door, make some noise and be ready to jump the last man in. If they have arms and armour, bolt and plead mercy on the court if they catch you.

So I made it look like I made big deal over getting up when I got by the door and I could barely stifle a laugh as the guard walked right on in, pistol in holster and not even bothering to check his corners. '_Oh, rookies_' I thought, '_You so easy_...'

As he neared the bed, I slammed my fist into a pressure point on his neck, knocking him out immediately as I quickly took his sidearm and placed it in the doorframe. I didn't want to lock myself in here with a man who would be _grouchy_ when he got up. And gawd-dammit, he was also built far too big for me to filch his uniform – given its well-made nature, it was a fair guess that it was tailored, which meant the rest of these people wore tailored uniforms and it would therefore be obvious if I walked around in a uniform not made to measure. Joys.

Still, it wasn't a complete waste – I lay him out on the bed and covered him up – with any luck they'd think I was still out of it, so if I could lay low then I could at least have some more time when they checked on me.

Now, there's this funny old trick I learned when sneaking out for personal activities over the years. When you're sneaking out, there's no point in looking for cameras – unlike video games, it's almost guaranteed the first one will see you so you might as well be quick. Likewise for guards, if there was more than one guy in the hallway, he'd have accompanied the first dude in or would have raised the alarm at the open door with a pistol in the door frame.

With this in mind, I darted out into the hallway, leaving the handgun behind as I rounded corner after corner in my escape attemt – I didn't know what it was and the size of it convinced me it might just break my wrist if I handled it wrong. And as I rounded a corner, I saw a bugger _at least_ as big as Fury. Which goes for something, because I may not have said it before, but he's six-nine, works out a lot and could knock me out in one punch if I let him. He also looked angry. Very, _very_ angry – Fury when he caught me in coitus with his sister angry.

I shoulda kept the gun.

'_Well_', I thought as I rushed him, '_That's stealth out the window! Here's to the Glass Jaw!_'

I hit him with a blow to the head that would have sent Fury back a step or two, but all his head did was snap one way, then right back again as he grinned wickedly. And I couldn't help but match his grin as he wrapped a meaty hand around my neck and hoisted me into the air.

"Any last words, _Surat_?" he growled, loosening his grip a little so I could breath. God, air had never tasted so good...

"Best two outta three?" I croaked out, still grinning for some reason.

No wait, I'm a nutcase who can't help but see the humour in all this. That's the reason.

Go therapy...

"Humour in the face of death!" the big guy bellowed with a grin before his face turned serious, "Now let us see if you have such humour on the other side, _Surat_." He seethed as he squeezed my neck and once again cut off my air until I heard someone cry "_ENOUGH_!"

And with what must be some of the best discipline around, the guy dropped me on my ass like a hot potato, wheeled around and made with the fervent apologies.

'_Funny_' I thought, getting up and panting a little as my lungs filled with sweet, sweet air, '_He sounds familiar_'

"Be silent" said the familiar voice, "And make sure the _Surat_ does not escape again."

And that was all the motivation he needed to turn around and draw the biggest damn pistol I'd ever seen in my life. All that went through my mind was '_Hand Cannon_', possibly, but hopefully not, followed by hot lead and skull fragments.

"You are not going to try and run?" he asked as he walked around the big guy. Might just run laps around him one day, it'd be good exercise, and two more well-made uniforms. Yeah, they got tailored uniforms, the lucky bastards.

"Okay, bust out of a medical bay in enemy turf? That's stupid. Brave, but stupid," I replied, "Try taking a guy who just took your best left hook _after_ he gets himself a gun? Even I'm not that stupid." Actually, I was; twice, in fact. I wasn't too keen over being shot a third time.

And it was now I got a good look at him. He was a little taller than me, and he definitely looked well built. Then again, the military lifestyle does tend to leave one well-toned. He also had a slight tan, no doubt from many hours spent training, while he maintained long, black hair in a low ponytail and his green eyes seemed to look straight through you.

"So you'll be Jacob Ward?" I asked, taking a step back from the big guy.

"Aff, Surat" he replied, staring me down, "And you will be Nikolai Kerensky?"

"The one and only; the man voted for four years running as the hardest guy to kill in the Star League, commander of the four-forty-second, at your service. Please don't let the big guy choke me again."

"I believe the first one, doubt the second and will take the third into consideration." Ward replied, massaging his temples. I had that effect on people. "And I doubt the second because the four-hundred-and-forty-second Royal division went missing two years before the exodus."

'_And two plus two equals four, O intelligent one_' I thought as I let an exasperated sigh escape me.

"We left because General Aleksandr Kerensky _told_ us to. Did you honestly think he would perform an act as big as he did, _without_ sending a scout ahead? For the first, ah, how big was that fleet anyway? Seventy-five, eighty percent of the forces? I think that's what he wanted to take, at least. I think there was around a year's worth of recon probe data for them to follow before we had the mis jump."

"You imply you served the purpose of scouting ahead for us. It would seem you failed in that."

I grinned at that as I replied, "Over sixty consecutive jumps with rapid battery recharges between them. Yeah, _something_ was going to go wrong. Hell, we had a betting pool going as to how long that would... Wait, _failed_?"

"Around one year after the Star League Defence Force left, there was a sudden mutiny. Our records indicate little reason for such action until then. Although the loss of reliable reconnaissance data could well have been what led to it."

"So, what year is it at the moment? The date and time systems on my War Ship still read August 2783, and we crashed about two months ago."

"It is January of 3049." he replied, "And we are a few months travel away from the Periphery."

I whooped in celebration at that. I'd _actually won that one_. Unfortunately, that action also got two pistols drawn at me.

"Ah. Right. Remember how I said we had a betting pool? It turns out I've only gone and won it."

"I do not know much of betting pools, but surely that one would have been closed already?" Ward replied incredulously, his aim going slack for a moment as Andre the giant's great grandson gave me an incredulous look.

"Eh, our pools tend to deal with outcomes that could come back and bite us years after the incident. To that point, all pools are held open until only one participant of a betting pool remains or evidence dictates only one outcome within the pool is possible, at which point the winner is decided. Because I bet on a jump through time, the pool wasn't paid out until a second source confirmed the date and time."

Ward and the big guy looked at each other. Then back to me. Then back to each other, and finally back to me.

"That explanation was _distressingly_ thorough." Ward stated, "And now I have yet more reason to believe you are indeed who you say you are."

"That said; can I get your statement on paper? Maybe a few other signatures for good..."

I stopped when Ward gave me an agitated glare complete with eyebrow twitch. Yeah, he knew I had to be the real deal. I always seemed to grate the nerves of those who think they're in charge of me.

Well, except the old man, he found some of my actions funny. I think he had a collection of the crazier security footage for 'morale purposes'.

Safety Samba, anyone?

"In which case, I'd like to ask what happened to the Exodus forces. I can hazard a guess as, but I don't want to make too many assumptions here."

"We are what became of them. We are the Clans, and now we return to unite the Inner Sphere under us! The Star League will be reborn!"

I cut him off before he got _too_ long-winded and started monologuing. Christ, these guys sounded like those radicals back at ComStar...

"Either you unite the Inner Sphere under the banner of the Clans." I replied through grit teeth, "Or you unite them under the banner of the Star League. Sure, you may be directly descended from the Soldiers of the Exodus, but you aren't them. You aren't the Star League Defence Force, either. So either you continue this crusade of yours as the Clans, or you fly in under the banner of the SLDF and fulfil the goal General Aleksandr Kerensky had in mind and return to unite and protect the Inner Sphere."

That dug at his pride a little, and his reply was less than friendly, spoken through grit teeth and furrowed brow.

"And what can you do, _Surat_?" he almost growled back, "You have no way of escaping our Drop Ship, no way off this rock and no way of contacting anybody if you did!"

The first part of my reply was making that "Wrong" buzzer sound that permeated those corny game shows Lyla liked to watch. "My men are coming for me, and we have our own War Ship." I calmly replied, crossing my arms, "And we do have ways of contacting people. But on the flip side, we have nobody to contact."

"If you truly had a War Ship, it would have to be stranded on this planet. You are more helpless than you think." he stated, grinning like he had me cornered. Technically, he did.

"Oh, we can get the ship out; it'd be easier with help is all. Sure, we might be dead in the water for a month while we make repairs from the inevitable short-range explosions, but she'll survive, be space worthy and we'll still hit the Inner Sphere before you." I said smugly. "See, you guys didn't take those SLDF communications buoys with you to your new home, and that means our Prototype Unit status gives us complete priority over them. We simply get our bearings and head back there at full speed and under SLDF era IFF codes, which any pre-Exodus base will still recognise."

Jacob Ward eyed me suspiciously. I think he knew what I was going to say, but he still asked. "What is your point?"

"My point is that if the 'Sphere did as planned, they'd have scavenged a lot of old tech. Which means old SLDF ships will still have valid IFF codes." I continued with a grin, "So while you, and indeed many in the 'Sphere would doubt what I say, they would not doubt their RADAR stations, which means when a Periphery planet sees us coming in with valid Royal Division IFF codes, they'll check a few times and believe us."

The man continued to eye me when I finished, agitation creeping into his features, "And what is to stop me from killing you here and now, _Surat_?" he asked with a fist clenched and teeth once again grit.

"Because as I already said; my men are coming. Nobody here is stupid. Both of us left our homes with people we trust with our lives." I reasoned, grinning a little. "And if they find out I'm dead... Well, consider our earlier fight. That was me and four others and not only did we not fire first, we were also working to keep as much of our machinery intact as possible, which is why my men fell back so easily. And you saw what we did to you under those circumstances."

Ward's eyes widened slightly as he began to comprehend.

"And imagine if you will; facing the five of us when we have no need to preserve the Royal-level equipment, no need for diplomacy and are _out for revenge_ in an environment suited to our laser boats. Now imagine a Drop Ship consignment's worth of fire power that pissed off and coming for you, specifically."

My grin widened and I arched an eyebrow, "So, what is stopping you from killing this _Surat_ now?"

Ward seethed a little at that. It was always a good idea to let the enemy know just how bad an idea killing you actually was, especially when one has the firepower to back it up.

"It does not matter, 'General'," he spat back. "We have spent nigh-on two hundred years preparing for this! We have the firepower, the technology, and the men! You may kill us now, but I am merely a Star Colonel in a force comparable to the Armada that left! The Will of Kerensky is with us, _Surat, _and We. Will. Not. Lose!"

I suppressed an irritated groan; The Will of Kerensky? Okay, ComStar, your nutters have been matched. Please make your counter-offer and give the rest of us time to get well clear; preferably to another dimension.

"The will of Kerensky?" I retorted, almost shouted, catching them off-kilter. He wouldn't have wanted this, of all things. "This? This is _not_ his Will. He wanted to return to unite the Inner Sphere, not conquer it. He left to prevent others from using that armada to do _exactly what you are trying to do_!"

And that was the sinker. Don't ask me where the hook and line are, I don't track those two. Still, it'd caught at least Ward off-guard. If I played this right, then I might have some allies in the coming wars.

"Then what would you have us do?" he tentatively replied after a minute, "From where I stand, we are two sides of a single coin. Where does the difference between our two methods lie?"

But damn, he had a point there. So I took a second or so to contemplate before I explained myself. "We differ in our methods. We have the same goal – the unification of the Inner Sphere. We seek to turn the denizens of the Inner Sphere into allies, into men willing to fight – and die – for the Star League. You? You want to dominate them, turn them into servants, and become dictators forcing them to fight for causes they don't believe in."

"And why do you feel you are right?" Ward countered, "They need to be controlled! Our scouts showed us that with their reports of the perpetual wars fought against each other."

"They don't need to be controlled." I answered, "My commanding officer did what he did to take an army that would have led to the destruction of the Inner Sphere out of the equation. His goal was to leave and return when the wars had died down a little, when the Inner Sphere could be united under a common banner once again. _That_ is his true will – that the descendants of the Star League would one day unite the Inner Sphere, not conquer it."

Jacob looked convinced by this, which meant that some of these so-called Clanners weren't all for an invasion. "Perhaps you are indeed correct." he said, a contemplative look set on his face, "As a Clan, we were against this invasion. But our method of politics meant that once war was decided, we could not protest. Instead, we participated to ensure at least one corridor would be occupied by us and so our fellow Clans would be humiliated by the success of those most devoutly against this war."

"Then break away from them." I replied, "Find those who would fight alongside you and join us. You already have the men under you, and your people. And I doubt yours was the only Clan against this war."

Ward went quiet for a few moments, during which the big guy sized me up and I made a mental note to prepare to _bolt_ if things went south of the border. The metaphorical Mexican one, that is.

"We have some allies amongst the Clans. Furthermore, Clan Nova Cat was against such an invasion – it was not until we recovered a wayward Jump Ship that they agreed to this war."

"So that's potentially a second army." I replied, "All we would need is enough to take a few systems before declaring our intentions."

"And what would those intentions be?" he asked in response.

"To unite the Periphery and Inner Sphere under the banner of the Star League once more."

He actually chuckled a little at that.

"You are truly naive, _Surat_, if you believe they will listen."

"Would you listen to a man in charge of an army bearing SLDF markings?" I asked, "There are always romantics who see the previous era as the Golden Era, and some units elected to stay behind to act as a staging platform for the eventual return of the armada, while most have enough sense to know when they are defeated."

"I do not know if I would listen in their position." he cautiously replied, "People can be very hard to persuade."

"You listened to me." I replied, smiling a little, "You have an entire Drop Ship at your command and you listened to me."

"It would seem the Nova Cat lore master travelling with us was right about something significant being here." he contemplated, "General Nikolai Kerensky, as incredible as your story may be, I find myself with no reason to doubt you. Regardless of what my fellow warriors and Clans think, we will fight towards this cause. You may consider the men of my War Ship detachment allies, but we must arrive before the rest of the Clans."

I grinned at this. This could work. It'd be an uphill battle, but if we played our cards right, the Star League might once again exist...

_"Our line of work isn't about pride, or honour, or glory. It's about putting them down before they put you, or those important to you, down."_

**[A/N: I said RADAR, but I don't care to remember what the technical term is. Also, I re-wrote every chapter from scratch, I had both the old and new drafts up at all times. It was actually faster this way...]**


End file.
